These days, you’re just not “with the program” if you’re not involved with social bookmarking. Recently I have been trying to increase my Plug-in Profit Site’s traffic numbers to a certain daily level, and one way to do that is by getting into one of the newer internet trends – social bookmarking.

Social bookmarking is a neat way of saving websites, articles, and blog posts that you consider your favorites. Then you can easily get back to these posts, share these same sites with others on the web, add other saved sites to your list of saved sites, or subscribe to someone’s blog for example.

Usually we bookmark pages we like on our own computers, but social bookmarking allows us to save them on the web for others to see as well. The way we do this is by creating a title, description, and tags (which are the keywords we are targeting) for the pages we want to save. This should generate some new traffic for you fairly quickly from others who use social bookmarking sites and are looking for articles based on the tags you have chosen.

If you own a Plug-in Profit Site, it’s easy to start using social bookmarking sites. If you do a Google search for “social bookmarking sites” for example, you will find a list of the top social bookmarking sites. One of the most famous ones is called “del.icio.us”, and other popular ones are “Digg”, “Yahoo”, and “Furl”.

It doesn’t take long to set these up. But first you have to go to those social bookmarking sites, and create a free account with a username. Once you’ve done that, you are free to use the service to find topics that interest you, or post your own favorite pages.

When you set up an account, you will likely be given a choice of buttons you can add to your toolbar that you can simply copy and paste. Then when you visit a site you want to bookmark publicly, you can simply click on that button on your toolbar, type in a title, description, and tags for that page, and voila! You have saved a page that others can also access!

On your Plug-in Profit Site, there are a few ways to get more traffic using social bookmarking sites. One way is to write quality, original content on your blog, such as posting your own article. On your social bookmarking service, you should be able to find a piece of code to add to your Plug-in Profit Site’s HTML code which will be like the button on your toolbar for the different services.

For example, on my blog, I have four buttons at the end of each blog post which I added to my blog’s template code. These four buttons would lead a reader who like my post to Digg, Furl, Yahoo, and del.icio.us, where they can add a title, description, and tags to submit my post and bring me more traffic.

The nice thing for Plug-in Profit Sites, or any website for that matter is that it’s okay to do this for your own article posts, as long as you do not spam the social bookmarking services.

You don’t really want to send each and every post you make to your blog to one of these services in the attempt to get more traffic when maybe not all your posts are fantastically written, original content. You want to provide something of value to your readers just as you would do in the discussion forums you frequent, and not over-do it.

Some article directory sites now are allowing you to “Digg” your own articles. Again, if you do it slowly and in moderation, you won’t likely be accused of spamming. Be careful because if you do go overboard, some people have been known to get their websites banned from services like Digg.

Another way to boost your Plug-in Profit Site traffic with social bookmarking sites is to actually get yourself involved with these services and use them the way they are intended to be used – don’t just “Digg” your own posts. Find other posts that you like and add a comment, or save them in your own archived lists.

Last but not least, whenever you write an article or blog post for your Plug-in Profit Site business, be sure to use Technorati or other tags in your author bio-box at the end that link back to your main website. Look up information on “tag and ping” to find out the correct format and you will get more traffic quickly!

Weblogs, or “blogs” were introduced in 1997. As with most new technology the initial users of blogs were those gifted in the field of technology.

The growth of blogging began as the user interface became more simplified requiring no knowledge of HTML or other specialized coding.

Today blogging is used for personal as well as business applications. In the domain of business blogging (B-Blogging) many businesses are seeing the value of a b-blog and are allowing key personnel to blog on company time. The reasons are varied, but a b-blog is useful in presenting the face behind the brand.

The best b-blogs do not look at this format of information sharing as simply a means to say whatever comes to mind. A helpful b-blog for business is one that provides customers with the following.

1) INFORMATION – Customers are interested in the latest news on the products you offer and they may be very interested in the benefits your product or service has to offer.

2) ANNOUNCEMENTS – By providing important new offerings or staff changes, your client may feel more connected to your firm.

3) CONTESTS – In keeping with the fun nature of a b-blog, contests can be conducted through a blog that can supply visitors with a chance to receive promotional products.

4) SALES – If you will be conducting a sale on your products a b-blog can provide an easy way to pass that information along to people who are genuinely interested in what you have to offer.

5) JUST THE FAQ’S – A b-blog is an effective way to solicit questions and then respond to them in your blog.

One of the key functions of a b-blog is to raise awareness and trust for your products and/or services while keeping things light, informal and highly personable.

B-blogs can be updated as often as you need to and your posts do not need to be exceptionally long. You should say what needs to be said and sign off. By making your comments short and to the point you will likely discover your visitors will respond better than if you insist on drawing things out.

Unlike email, customers who regularly visit b-blogs indicate it is a bonus to see the personality behind the company name. At the end of the day if you have encouraged a customer to remain a customer or if you find new prospects visiting your blog then your goodwill gesture has actually moved from a nice idea to a valuable marketing tool. Isn’t that what you wanted in the first place?